by Vered Ehsani
“Hurt what?” Mr. Timmons inquired as he entered the kitchen from the living area.
“I never thought I’d ever have cause to say this,” Gideon gushed, “but I’m so relieved that you’re here, Mr. Timmons. Your coldhearted wife is beating a defenseless baby.”
“I am not,” I protested just as the baby in question howled pitifully.
“I see,” Mr. Timmons observed. “So when she’s beating babies, she’s my wife?”
“Well, no wife of mine would countenance such demonic behavior,” Gideon retorted. “Clearly she’s been living under your influence for quite some time. This odious action is the result.”
The baby-beating wife in question was meanwhile attempting to free both her kitchen and her stick from the clutches of a determined monkey. “Some assistance would be gratefully accepted,” I grunted as I swung the stick toward the window.
“It’s a rather sweet creature you have there,” Mr. Timmons said, not bothering to disguise or restrain his mirth. “Perhaps we shouldn’t be too hasty in ridding ourselves of it.”
“If by ‘it’ you mean this hairy beast, I disagree,” I said, propping the end of the stick against the windowsill.
“Beatrice, that’s no way to describe your current husband,” Gideon admonished me, his eyes twinkling. “After all, Mr. Timmons had no say in his appearance. It was the misfortune of birth with which some are afflicted.”
“Bother,” I muttered as the monkey spat at me. “Men are utterly useless at times.”
The useless men were both gripped by fits of laughter that caused Gideon to sink into the floor while Mr. Timmons leaned against a wall for support. In any other instance, I would’ve been both amazed and reassured upon seeing my two husbands united by a common enjoyment. As the baby had yet to release its death grip and rejoin its mob of fellow monkeys, I was less than amused.
“Give it here,” Mr. Timmons said as he recovered from his bout of merriment and took the walking stick from me. Striding outside, he pushed the bundle of fur with his boot until he was able to brandish a monkey-free walking stick above his head.
“My hero,” I proclaimed as I clapped a few times.
“You’re not seriously intending to leave it out here on its own?” Gideon spoke into my ear. “What if it gets eaten before the mother returns?”
“I’ll let Jonas know not to touch it,” Mr. Timmons said, not bothering to contain his snicker.
Scowling, Gideon turned his soft brown gaze to me. “Beatrice. Please?”
I flung up my hands. “If the mother hasn’t returned by this evening and no one has eaten it, I’ll adopt the beastie until we can find a solution.”
Satisfied, Gideon floated over to the baby and hovered next to it, as if he could battle any predator away with the force of his glare.
“I had no idea he was so protective of babies,” Mr. Timmons said as we re-entered the cottage.
I glanced back at Gideon, who remained in his position as self-appointed guardian angel of a monkey baby. “Neither did I.”
Chapter 5
THE FRETFULNESS I’D experienced earlier returned. After lunch, I came to the conclusion that I needed a more meaningful outing than fetching the post. Mr. Timmons had been unfazed by the enigmatic nature of Cilla’s telegram and the remainder of the letters were to do with his import business. Thus occupied, he retreated to his office to handle those matters that required his attention.
“I’m going for a ride,” I called out through his closed door.
“Why?” was the muffled reply. “The weather could turn foul at any moment.”
I glanced out a window. The sun was a watery version of its usual sharpness, the heat and brightness much dissipated by clouds that in the distance were a foreboding dark gray. Still, the ground had dried up considerably. Instead of having the consistency of a muddy swamp, it was more a muddy meadow.
Not to be dissuaded by a bit of monsoon rain, I said as much.
The door swung open to reveal Mr. Timmons. “I’m not sure it’s a good idea. I’ve had news that the rivers are swollen with flood water, and bridges have been swept away.”
“Then I won’t be traversing over any rivers, now will I?” I said.
He sighed and rubbed at the frown marring his forehead. “I’d accompany you but I’m sorting out an urgent issue regarding a delayed delivery. The rails are also flooded.”
“Then I’ll avoid traveling by train as well,” I reassured him.
He leaned against the doorway, his arms crossed over his chest, his stormy gaze studying me. “Can I at least request that you not drown in any flash floods?”
I visualized Lilly when she was younger and seeking to persuade her parents to allow her a treat. I projected what I hoped was a beguiling smile and said, “I’ll take your recommendation under consideration.”
He placed his hands on either side of my face. “I’m serious, Beatrice. No running off into potentially hazardous situations.”
“As if.”
He snorted. “Your reputation suggests otherwise.” His gaze softened, and he kissed me with such fervor that I was sorely tempted to abandon my search for distraction outside the house. As if divining my thoughts, he sniggered. “You’d better be going or I shall never finish my tasks. Please try to return with all your limbs intact.”
Armed with that sage advice, I returned to the barn, waving to Gideon on the way. Sniffing disdainfully, he turned his back to me and remained beside the baby monkey.
As was to be expected, Nelly was sleeping and Jonas was nowhere to be found. “It does make one wonder why we hired him in the first place,” I muttered as I pulled a bridle off its peg.
“Yao has often wondered the same,” a silky voice said beside my ear.
I spun about while raising my walking stick, preparing to pulverize the intruder with the metal fist, only to find myself facing a firefly. I didn’t bother to squint at it, for I knew what I’d see: the energy form of a vampire. Instead, I glanced about for the other Adze and was somewhat relieved to see nothing more obnoxious than the ox and Mr. Timmons’ horse.
“Indeed,” I said, pulling myself upright. It wasn’t that I was slouching; a woman of my slightly diminutive stature cannot afford to allow her spine to sag. I merely pulled back my shoulders, as if in preparation for action, although what that might be remained to be seen. “If you’re searching for Gideon, he’s out by the front of the cottage, overseeing to the wellbeing of a monkey.”
In a flash, the firefly became a young, overly attractive African man with a delightful pout on his lips. “Yao saw Gideon already. He’s very boring, mothering a baby, and has refused to do anything fun today.” His countenance brightened as he gazed at the bridle in my hand. “And where are you going, Miss Knight?”
“Out. Alone.”
Yao shook his head. “Yao can’t allow Miss Knight to travel about unaccompanied. There are many dangers in these lands.”
Either the young Adze was unaware of the concept of irony or he truly believed that he posed no danger to me. In any case, I suspected I would be hard pressed to dissuade him from joining me; he was clearly eager for some distraction that my deceased former husband refused to provide. Truth be told — and I would never tell him this — I wouldn’t mind the company, for I had no idea how the day would unfold and it couldn’t hurt to have a little extra force on hand.
We set off, with Yao loping alongside Nelly. The hill’s tree-speckled slope gradually flattened out into more grassy terrain with scrubby shrubs and solitary thorn trees scattered here and there. The path we followed was well used by horses, goats and people, and was a line of bare brown earth amidst the blossoming, verdant growth that the rains had summoned. I closed my eyes and inhaled the sweet perfume of watered soil and flowering plants, Nelly’s hay-scented warmth and Yao’s coppery scent.
Somehow, these smells reminded me of Kam, and I wondered when he would make his appearance. It wasn’t that I was in any hurry to renew my acquaintance wi
th Anansi the Trickster God. While a meeting with the Spider was inevitable, I dreaded what he would ask of me almost as much as I loathed the prospect of facing an insect that was too large to squash underfoot.
“Your horse has funny eyes,” Yao commented after some time as we veered away from town and toward the open savannah.
My gloomy musings interrupted, I explained, “She was once possessed by a serpent spirit.”
“Oh, how thrilling!” Yao said, his eyes wide and sparkling with anticipation. “And then what happened?”
“She ate it,” I replied. “So now she has a penchant for devouring flowers and flying through the air. In addition to that, her eyes glow from time to time.”
Yao studied Nelly with renewed interest and some respect. “Does she eat flies?”
“No,” I said, smiling. “I believe you should be safe around her.”
The man puffed out his chest, and it took some effort on my part not to ogle at the result. “Yao is not afraid of a flower-eating horse,” he said even as he distanced himself from Nelly when she snorted her opinion on the matter.
“Of course not,” I said. “What a relief. This bridge is still standing.”
Ahead of us was one of the three main rivers that meandered through the Nairobi environs, collecting water from numerous tributaries. The rivers eventually merged into one that someone with an abominable lack of imagination had called Nairobi. The predictably named river meandered in a north-easterly direction toward the distant ocean.
With the recent and dramatic arrival of the rains, the meandering trickle was more of a gushing torrent; the river’s churning water nearly overflowed its banks. A few more storms and we would certainly have severe floods. While other bridges had been swept away numerous times, the wooden footbridge stubbornly clung to both banks, hovering a mere hand-width above the surface of the river.
“Miss Knight wants to cross over that?” Yao whispered with consternation, gesturing to the wooden bridge.
The frothing water generated a fine mist around us. I wiped condensation from my face. “Unless you’d prefer to swim across?” I asked.
Yao shuddered. “No, Yao doesn’t swim. Yao doesn’t like water.”
“What about bathing?”
Frowning, he asked, “Does that mean sitting in water?”
I chuckled. “That would normally be a requirement.”
“No. No sitting in water. No swimming in water. No water,” he replied with such an adamant expression that I ceased laughing.
“Well then, we will have to part company at this juncture,” I announced, “for I intend to cross the bridge.” And so saying, I slid off Nelly and began to lead her toward the rickety structure. Her hoofs clopped against the wooden planks, a steady beat to the tumultuous roar of the swollen river. A fine spray settled refreshingly against my skin.
“Oh, Miss Knight,” Yao moaned as he flew up to my shoulder in his firefly form. “You are too rascally. Yao isn’t sure if he likes you for that or not. Maybe he even loves you.”
“Yao should really consider using the first person when referring to himself,” I commented although with less sternness than I had planned. How could I lecture a man on proper grammar when he’d just declared his feelings for me?
The Adze declined to respond but remained immediately above my shoulder. For the life of me, I couldn’t image what he hoped to achieve by doing so. Was it for his own benefit or for mine that he maintained this proximity? If it was a sense of chivalry that inspired him, how did he expect to assist me as a bug?
I was on the verge of questioning him on his motives when a motion from within the river distracted me. I paused to study it, for the ripples were not those caused by water rushing around and about large rocks.
“Why are you stopping?” the little insect yelped at me. “This is no time to look at the scenery. This is the time to scamper off the bridge. Miss Knight, Yao isn’t happy, not at all.”
“Then you may continue or return,” I said, leaning my hands against the slender, waist-high wooden handrail and frowning at the odd ripples that were now moving against the strong current and toward the bridge. “What sort of animals live in the river?”
“The wet kind,” Yao groaned.
I sighed and shook my head. “European vampires aren’t scared of water or if they are, they would never admit it.”
My utterance had the desired effect, for an enraged Adze materialized by my side, fangs gleaming before my face. “Yao isn’t scared. He’s merely—”
Whatever he was merely doing, I never did discover for the ripples ceased their motion as something rammed into the bridge.
Chapter 6
WHATEVER HAD COLLIDED with the bridge was sizable. The entire structure shuddered and lurched steeply to one side to the tune of wood splintering. Yao shrieked and his talons dug into my arm while Nelly crashed against the railing. The wood snapped against her weight and, neighing in protest, she stumbled into the river.
“Nelly,” I screamed even as I began to slip after her. Before I could follow her into the foamy water, Yao yanked me against him while clinging to the railing on the upstream side of the footbridge.
“European vampires are foolish,” Yao spat out.
I was in no mood to argue. Nelly was being swept away with great rapidity, and I marveled that she was able to keep her head above the surface amidst the turbulence that buffeted her. The sight of her was replaced by a serpent that reared out of the water, its head almost as long as I was tall and resembling that of a horse’s. Antennas waved above its solid black eyes and from under its flaring nostrils and chin. A green slime covered its scales, and it was a challenge to discern its true color. At that moment though, I was less interested in its colors and more interested in its intentions. I glanced over Yao’s shoulder and back the way we had come; the bridge had been torn away from its connection to the embankment and a section was now submerged.
“This is why Yao doesn’t like water,” the Adze yelled above the fish-scented bellow of the serpent.
“You could’ve mentioned there was a giant snake dwelling in the river,” I shouted back.
Incredulous, Yao asked, “Well, where else would the Inkanyamba live?”
The Inkanyamba reared back as if equally affronted by my ignorance of such matters, its horsey nostrils quivering in outrage. Or perhaps it was deciding where next to strike or which of us to devour first. It eased a portion of its hefty length onto the section of bridge over which Nelly had plummeted; the wood groaned under its weight and water lapped at our feet.
“Bad snake!” cried Yao. “Yao’s feet are being washed with water!”
What else one’s feet would be washed with was a mystery I dared not explore, particularly as the serpent was now blocking our progress and was close enough that its cold scales slid against us, leaving a green smear on our arms. Its ears twitched as it neighed.
“The good news is that it doesn’t seem interested in eating us,” I commented, peering up at the large horse head that seemed indifferent to our plight.
“That is good.”
“The unfortunate news is that it might inadvertently crush us or fling us into the river to drown,” I added.
“Yao is too young to die,” he wailed.
I didn’t bother to ask what age an Adze considered as ‘too young’ for I was attempting to maneuver my walking stick into a position from which I could stab the underbelly of the serpent. Yao’s grip on me however prevented me from any course of useful action apart from breathing, and for once I didn’t find myself in the least bit distracted by his fine physique or silky voice.
“Brrr.”
With the Adze’s complaints, the river’s roar, the serpent’s bellowing and the bridge’s noisy demise, I didn’t hear the little Tokolosh until she popped out of the water immediately before me.
“Burr,” I said. It was with no small degree of relief that I recalled my little friend’s ability to tame giant snakes.
The
water sprite twitched her large, bat ears as she clucked at me, the small river stone visible behind her jagged teeth. The creature reminded me very much of a baboon but her face was flatter, longer and wider, and her neck was nearly non-existent; the narrow eyes were solid black and the brown hair had a film of green. Reaching no higher than just above my knees, Burr was nonetheless heavily muscled and not without powers. Her legs were disproportionately short for her squat body, as if she suffered from a form of dwarfism, but that didn’t prevent her from moving across water with alarming rapidity.
“Get it away from Yao,” Yao squealed and kicked at Burr as she approached. “Terrible water beasts.”
Before I could chastise Yao for his rudeness, the bridge snapped in two. The half of the bridge that the serpent was on splintered and sunk into the river. Burr clicked and clucked, the serpent bellowed and Yao howled. All I could think of was how cross Mr. Timmons would be if I died, even if for once I hadn’t performed any operation more dangerous than crossing a bridge. He could be obstinate in that way.
If not for Yao clinging to the railing and to me, I would most certainly have slipped into the water and followed the way of Nelly, without the benefit of four legs unencumbered by a skirt. As it was, water splashed against my legs, matting the fabric against my skin and further limiting my movements.
Burr chattered and waved her hairy little arms, causing the serpent to rear out of the water once again.
“Delightful,” I muttered. “Now it’s coming for its snack.”
“Eat her!” Yao yelled and hid behind me. “She’s far juicier than Yao.”
“You are deplorable,” I said, wondering if I would have a chance to smack my stick over his head before being swallowed up by the water snake. Burr hissed in agreement and made a gesture. As if in response, the serpent lowered its broad head before me.
“Brrrr,” Burr said as she hopped onto the head and gestured to me to follow.
“You clever little thing,” I said, delighted that I would no longer have to explain to Mr. Timmons how I drowned while crossing a bridge.